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Touching Jewishness
Dan Alexander
Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav got it right when he said two things:
- 1) Life is a narrow bridge. The most important thing is not to
be afraid.
2) Maybe my answers will become your questions, and your questions
my answers.
When I joined a synagogue in 1994 at age 22, I became the first
person in my father or mother's immediate family to formally belong
to a Jewish community since the time my father was Bar Mitzvah.
My parents had, and still have, profound difficulty expressing
their Jewishness for differing reasons. For my father's family,
the Holocaust had impressed a great deal of pain upon the conundrum
of doubt and faith that kept them Jewish in the modern world.
But ties to family, to the ethical foundation of liberal Jewish
society, and to learning remained.
In my mother's case, her socialist father had married a remarkable
woman of hard-working, liberal Unitarian heritage. My maternal
grandfather, who I love and respect, left Brooklyn for an American
life and an American family. Although I am a fairly observant
Jew, and have become Bar Mitzvah as an adult, my identity as a
Jew is therefore dependent upon a flexible and humane interpretation
of Jewish law.
I had slowly admitted to myself that being Jewish was fundamental
to who I was. But what was that? In college, I only felt comfortable
participating at the periphery of Jewish life, and no closer.
What right did I have to be there? I knew I wasn't just another
liberal white guy, another Midwesterner - there were certain patterns
in attitude, values, weirdnesses I was proud of ... so, nu? What
did it mean?
My senior year, I studied abroad. I studied London, I studied
my father's lively relatives, I studied myself making friends
with devout and not-so- devout Pakistani Muslims and a range of
quirky English people. I read three newspapers a day, attended
twenty plays, traveled constantly, and actually graduated anyway.
Meanwhile, I realized that I knew what I had to do.
I suppose my determination to affiliate to a synagogue, to touch
Jewishness at its essence, was the result of my soul, my neshamah,
flaring up. I felt more than a little crazy, but my ironic (Jewish)
sense of humor helped me get through my first experiences with
our tradition. Without any formal Jewish education, I had to learn
basic Jewish: Pesach [Passover], tzaddakim [righteous people],
Shabbas [Sabbath], halakhah [Jewish law] (still working on that).
Luckily, three synagogues in Chicago (one Reform leaning to tradition,
one liberal Conservative, and one progressive Orthodox) and a
Jewish Community Center had the good sense to put their hand out
in welcome to people like me. For a small annual fee, we wandered
in and out of synagogue and J.C.C. programming geared to the young
adult crowd. Most people were more knowledgeable than me, but
all of us needed a community that was meaningfully Jewish. Shabbas
dinners introduced me to other Jews in their twenties and thirties.
Gradually, I learned what being observant meant to different people,
what the leaders were doing and saying to help marginal Jews feel
safe with basic Jewish expression, and how to have a Jewish good
time. It didn't take long to find my place.
Through my affiliation with the Reform synagogue, I developed
skills in English and Hebrew study and prayer, and a far better
understanding of our tradition and our people. Emanuel Congregation
helps answer my need for both challenge and support in living
Jewishly as a whole person. A synagogue community is not the only
means of informing our inner life, our professional work, our
rational/intellectual outlook, and our relationships with others.
But where a synagogue exists that does focus on these goals, it
can do so wonderfully.
The challenge of growing with Judaism, rather than stagnating,
does not preclude formal ritual or engaging with life's great
and sustaining questions. Torah can be thought of as a struggle
with God's revelation, as it was for our ancestor Jacob who founded
our community, or for Moses, or any man or woman in our tradition.
Disputation, learning, and mutual support in upholding the commandments
are compatible, even if sometimes it takes work.
The question for so many of us is, how to get to that point? Is
the effort worth it? Of course, everything about synagogue life,
everything about Jewish life, is not perfect. There are many people
in any community who are not happy, who sometimes clash, etc.
The old saying is true: "two Jews, three opinions." Ultimately,
voluntary communities don't thrive without having some soul, or
neshamah. And many do thrive.
One unforgettable moment in my synagogue life was my Anshe Mitzvah
ceremony, where I became a "master of the commandments." This
means I could read and chant from the Torah, and had studied in
a small group with the Rabbi for a year. I had to relate my interpretation
of the meaning of the passage, which concerned prophecy, manna
from God, and birds carrying plague. It was challenging, but I
arrived at a pretty neat explanation of the whole episode. I related
what I thought God wanted in terms of belief in ultimate redemption,
how Moses really wasn't listening to God because of his frustration
(although I also said something nice about Moses), and finally
how I thought God balanced punishment with mercy.
Today, I find myself a veteran of the synagogue Board of Directors,
and contribute to things here and there. I am part of our synagogue's
efforts to support our movement in Israel (may there be peace),
and to work for social justice in Chicago. Of course, I am still
learning Jewishly, and regularly enjoy participatory prayer.
I am also a leader in a wonderful citywide justice organization,
the Jewish Council on Urban Affairs. J.C.U.A.'s young professional
division works alongside the broader organization as it partners
with other racial, ethnic, and religious groups acting for healthier
and more just urban communities. In this work, I have the pleasure
of collaborating with good, creative people of all kinds.
I'm moving into a beautiful home soon, near the shul, and will
be making use of its backyard porch and next year's warm weather
to offer Shabbes hospitality to friends from my community.
Dan Alexander develops real estate, principally affordable housing,
for The Resurrection Project, an institution-based organization
building healthy communities on Chicago's Mexican-American near
Southwest Side.
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